A person will not be able to work for the sake of bestowal if he doesn’t receive an experience of its importance, which serves him as fuel for completing the following steps. We are founded on egoism in order not to perform any pointless actions. Egoism aims us at the actions that bring a reward, a benefit; otherwise, it won’t let us perform the next act.

In spirituality, egoism helps us to act solely in the direction of the goal if its importance is greater than egoism; and if it there isn’t a goal, egoism offers us its own and opposite one, thereby aiming us at the goal. This is why it is called “help against you”.

Hence, in each action, even the one which is highly prepared, after the action, we must care to gain even greater importance of the goal than before, to gain a satisfaction from advancing toward the goal. This will be the fuel for the next action.

This always makes us think: Why, for what purpose, and for whose benefit do we act?
[24056]
From the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 10/15/10, “The Arvut”

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Question: How does working with the “wicked” differ from working with the “righteous”?

Answer: First of all, please understand that we are talking about the states a person experiences relative to the Creator. As Baal HaSulam explains in the “Introduction to The Study of the Ten Sefirot,” we need to undergo these states on the path: a complete wicked, an incomplete wicked, one in the middle, an incomplete righteous, and a complete righteous.

How do I measure these states though? Anybody you ask thinks they are at least those in the middle if not complete righteous. In truth, the only criterion of a correct assessment is self-annulment in the group. In our case, the environment is our measuring device. The common Kli (vessel) broke only so that you, by lowering your head before the group, could know where you are and receive strength from the Creator.

After the breaking, your Kli split into multiple parts. The Creator, who was present in it, also split, and is now in all of these parts. They are as the pieces of once whole puzzle that you are assembling according to the program designed Above. Thereby, you are restoring the parts of your soul, along with the parts of the Creator, parcels of Light that are hidden in them.

In this world, in your egoism, you perceive all of this as a physical group. But in truth, it isn’t a group. With time, the group will become a spiritual appellation to you. These are not people who sing songs and wish to unite, but rather in each of them, you discover a part of your Kli and a particle of the Creator planted in it.

Behind the friends’ faces, there is a spiritual environment. Now you clearly realize that the breaking, our current reality, and the friends allow you to engage in spiritual work. When the Creator has no value in your eyes, you feel a sinner, and to gain this value, you appeal to the environment. It contains the Kelim (vessels); the Creator dwells in it; and the Light pours into it and brings this spiritual meaning to you. Thus, everything is in one place: the person and all his parts he sees as alien to him at the moment.

[31840]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/5/11, “What Are the Misfortunes that Come to the Wicked Which Start From the Righteous in Work”

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Writings of Rabash, Dargot HaSulam “Come”
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The Book of Zohar – Selections, Chapter “Tzav (Command),” “All Came From the Dust,” Item 173
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Explanation of the Article, “Preface to the Wisdom of Kabbalah,” Lesson 10
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Rav Yehuda Ashlag “The Freedom,” “Two Forces in the Will to Receive: Attracting Force and Rejecting Force,” Lesson 11
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In order to give the Kli freedom of choice, the Creator put two opposite forces in it: reception and bestowal. Creation is in the middle between them as the third line, as the fulcrum of a scale, and it decides which way to incline. That is how we are given the opportunity to be independent.

Question: What does it mean that creation “decides”? After all, when faced with a choice between good and evil, I will always choose good.

Answer: It depends on what you consider good. There are two scales: true versus false, and bitter versus sweet. Creation is being offered two ways of evaluating: good can be the receiving desire or the bestowing desire, and either can be felt as evil as well. The analysis can be made by the fulfillment in the receiving vessel or by the fulfillment in the bestowing vessel, in the left line or the right line.

You have two opportunities, each containing many traits. From these traits you begin to piece together the picture of your attitude. You thereby build yourself, putting together your spiritual Partzuf with all of its organs, tendons, flesh, bones, and so on. That is how many details you have to bring together into one whole.
[32011]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/6/11, “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy”

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A person who starts studying the science of Kabbalah discovers that his previous notions are far from reality. “Body,” “soul,” and other familiar notions acquire a completely different meaning.

The science of Kabbalah arranges everything very simply, practically not leaving you any chance to get confused. There is a desire for pleasure, inside of which different forms of bestowal can be perceived. And that is the only thing happening in our reality.

Depending on what level of bestowal you are on, that is the reality you feel. You can feel reality on level zero, in other words, you can live in our world where the degree of bestowal equals zero. We are at the very bottom, but even here there are four developmental levels: still, vegetative, animate, and human.

Then, as you ascend up 125 levels of the spiritual ladder, you will attain the degree of bestowal, or in other words, the Creator. At the end, at the 125th level you will reach 100% bestowal.

We are talking about equivalence of form or how creation acquires a form of bestowal above the desire for pleasure. You must constantly ascend in your receiving desire in order to acquire the form of the bestowing desire over it. The form of bestowal you clothe over the receiving desire brings you to the degree of bestowal because you have actualized this to a specific measure. That is how you make yourself similar and equal to the Creator, becoming human (Adam).

In essence this is very simple: You only need to combine two qualities correctly, ascending up a slanted ladder that is built of two forces or two lines: the right and the left. Thus, beginners receive clear explanations. In fact, Kabbalists do not draw a distinction between the worlds. everything depends on the person: Develop your capability for the form of bestowal and you will see more than you now do.
[32013]
From the 4th part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/6/11, “The Wisdom of Kabbalah and Philosophy”

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Question: What is the Creator’s help?

Answer: If a person tries to reach love and unity above hatred and repulsion, he will see that this is impossible. Good intentions turn to their opposite every time.

At first when making unsuccessful efforts, a person feels that this happens to him because of himself. Later the same efforts show him that the reason for it is a certain external force.

Then, by accumulating more new impressions, a person discovers that it isn’t some foreign force, but the Upper Force that directs him in this way and illuminates his negative attitude to others by means of various situations in life. That is how a person starts to reveal the Creator as the cause of the negatives and positives. He discovers that the Creator is the force that’s necessary for combining opposite extremes. Without His help a person cannot combine these two qualities inside him.

After that, this also turns out to be insufficient. It’s not enough that the Creator helps a person improve his sensation and arrange his life comfortably. Until now my bad attitude to others was unpleasant to me, but now I want the opposite: to use everything for connecting with the Creator. The combination of opposites has to happen inside the Creator and be completed only there.

That is how a person gradually ascends up a slanted ladder. At first he wants to put his Kelim in order, but then with their help, he turns to the Creator and finds the right combination with Him. Stage by stage, the right attitude to creation becomes apparent in a person: He goes from the means to the cause, from efforts to correct his desires to the realization of why he is doing this and what he achieves by it.

The goal is not to enjoy fulfilling your vessel, but to attain the upper root by virtue of your work. Then your attitude changes: By uniting Bina with Malchut, you discover Keter, the point of the letter Yod (י), which is the beginning of the letter Aleph (א), symbolizing our work and ascent up a diagonal.
[31954]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/6/11, Writings of Rabash

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The descents show me that I will never realize the importance of the Creator alone; I will never come out of my egoism or find the strength within. However, every descent teaches me in its own way, revealing different weaknesses, properties, and degrees in me. Descents are followed by ascents, but at the end, one way or another, I always discover how powerless I am.

At first, I want to satisfy my egoism, which is referred to as discovering the number of angels in the skies. Then I switch over to the Creator, I want to “catch” Him and see the spiritual world. It appears to me as if the door of change needs to open before me and not within me.

Finally, I begin to understand that changes need to happen within me. I catch a thread of an answer to my question: Liberation must come from the outside because alone I am certainly incapable of it.

This work is done through descents and ascents until man comes to the threshold of truth, and then he understands that everything depends on him, on a change in his perception. The Light gives him the strength to do this; this strength cannot be found within. His demand is egoistic, but he lowers his head before the upper force allowing it to change him, agreeing slightly with the fact that everything comes from Above.

On the next degree, man begins to understand that he needs to acquire the property of bestowal instead of the property of reception. His demand is still egoistic, yet it’s a step forward.

Then he works with the environment in order to evoke the Light that lifts him to spiritual wealth. As he works on figuring out the notion of the group, he makes himself dependent on it, hoping that this will benefit him, as it did before.

And then the Light actually reforms a person because he has properly arranged everything. There is only one change that still remains: the intention, the final outcome, who is he trying to benefit?

By turning to the Creator, through the group, with the correct appeal, we shorten the path.
[31837]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/5/11, “What Are the Misfortunes that Come to the Wicked Which Start From the Righteous in Work”

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Dear Friends, please ask questions about these passages from the great Kabbalists. The commentaries in brackets are mine.

613 Suggestions and 613 Deposits

That explains to us why he calls the 613 Mitzvot 613 counsels [Eitin de Oraita, recommendations about how to correct the Kli] in several places in The Zohar, and in many other places in The Zohar he calls the 613 Mitzvot [Pkudin, the Lights that must enter the corrected Kli] “613 deposits.” This is so because at first, one must keep the Torah and the Mitzvot in order to purify his body [oneself from egoism] and enhance his soul [aspiration for love and bestowal].

At that time, the 613 Mitzvot are as 613 counsels [corrections of the Eitin type] for him, “tips” by which to gradually purify and be awarded coming before the King [rise above egoism], and receiving the Light of his face. This is because keeping Torah [drawing of the Light] and Mitzvot [correction of 613 egoistic desires] gradually purify him [from his natural egoism], until he is rewarded with the Light of the King’s face [universal property of bestowal and love; otherwise, there is no use in his actions].

Also, it is written similarly in the Gemarah: “The Creator cares not if one slaughters at the throat or slaughters at the back of the neck [in other words, mechanical acts themselves are pointless]? Rather, we were given the Torah and Mitzvot only to purify Israel [all who aspire to the Creator, to the property of “love others as yourself].”

However, after one has been sufficiently purified [from egoistic desires] and merits the Light of the King’s face [the property of bestowal], one’s eyes and soul [desire to bestow] open and he is awarded [within] the attaining the 613 Sacred Lights found in the 613 Mitzvot [corrected desires]. These are His Holy Names [attainment], the ones he can attain.

By keeping each of the Mitzvot [correction of a desire], one takes [inside] the part of the Light deposited in that Mitzva, since the Mitzva is a Kli (vessel) [the secret of the desire] where the Light is clothed, meaning a Holy Name that belongs specifically to that Mitzva. This is the meaning of “The Mitzva is a candle and the Torah—Light.” At that time, he calls the 613 Mitzvot “613 commandments (deposits).”
– Baal HaSulam, “Introduction to the Book, From the Mouth of a Sage”
[30613]

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In the News (From eiu.com): The results of the Economist Intelligence Unit’s “Democracy Index 2010” show a decline in democracy across the world’s regions. The report states that “the economic and financial crisis boosted some authoritarian regimes and accentuated existing negative political trends, most notably in Europe, both east and west.” The global trend in democratization has come to a halt in what Larry Diamond (2008) called a “democratic recession.” Democracy is in retreat.

Authoritarianism has been intensifying in Middle East and the former USSR. Democratization seems to cause disappointment in the masses. In Africa, it has come to a complete halt, whereas Latin America has developed a tendency toward populist movements.

In the West, the public’s participation in political life has also declined. The double standards the foreign policies and attacks on civil liberties cause disappointment in democratization and drive the public to accuse their own governments in hypocrisy.

My comment: According to Kabbalah, if the world doesn’t develop awareness of the natural plan of its development and choose to be similar to nature, then all presently existing political systems will be replaced by fascist and fundamentalist regimes, and the world will quickly fall into the 3rd world war. See Baal HaSulam’s book The Future Generation and newspaper “Ha Uma (The People).”
[31907]

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Question: How can I check whether my intention is really aimed at the Creator? What practical test does the science of Kabbalah have to offer?

Answer: Kabbalah offers something very simple: work in the group, which accelerates your personal development and provides you with a practice ground. Inside the group a person can find the place for the Creator’s revelation, the place to bestow to the Creator. Overall we attain the goal by way of mutual study and unification with friends.

At the same time, no matter what we do, it is important to ascertain that we do not suppress our egoism by trying to run away from bad sensations. After all, a person spends most of his time covering up his ego.

Inside us there is hatred, envy, lust, ambitions, and other attributes of interaction with others. Sometimes these desires are so small that a person does not even discern their evil. Yet, whenever I look at someone, I unconsciously or consciously make a calculation: how much better I am than him, how much I don’t accept him, how much power I have over him, how much I can use him, and so on.

I always have to feel higher than the neighbor in some way. Even if I don’t have anything to criticize, I am still higher.

Thus, if I don’t blur over my egoistic attitude, then at every second I reveal an opportunity to work. Overall my sensations are called "unfounded hatred." My nature dictates that I feel it toward every person. But can I immediately build a good attitude, love above it?

I hate every person for some reason and if I don’t conceal this from myself, then I can work ceaselessly until every situation turns into a means for coming closer to the Creator.
[31951]
From the 1st part of the Daily Kabbalah Lesson 1/6/11, Writings of Rabash

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